PANADORA

PANDORA  - Scalable, cross platform System Monitoring and alarm for broadcast

Realising a monitoring tool that not only measures if a parameter is right or not. Pandora could evaluate the state (right, wrong and intermediate values)

Software applications and IT systems are dominating today any Broadcast deployment; these are complex systems where, in case of a trouble or a fault, it could be difficult to identify it; therefore one of the most important tools in broadcast systems today is the possibility to monitor in real time any IT device as well as software services.

To streamline such a complex task, Media-Alliance integrated the open source Pandora FMS and developed scalable agents as well as new GUI to better meet broadcast scope.

Thanks to Pandora integration and implementation, today any system deployed by Media-Alliance has a centralized monitoring system that operates on application status, services, server, Video Servers, storage and in general, where is possible, any device or software connected to Media-Alliance system. Pandora does not only collect information through agents but through SNMP could monitor any hardware system with TCP/IP connectivity, such as Online storage or Tape Library or ALTO.

What Pandora is not: Pandora is not a tool for log analysis or/and correlation. Pandora could collect this information but it is not made for being efficient at collecting and processing a big amount of them. Pandora is not an analysis/correlation event tool. Same as with logs, it could recollect and process them, but again it is not its main function. Pandora is not a tool for intrusion detection or prevention, but it could be part of a complex one, reporting down machines or open and closed ports. Pandora is not a monitoring system in real time or a critical environments monitoring system. These systems are specialized systems and Pandora is a general one. In spite of this, Pandora could work in response margins quite shorts (+5 seconds) and use redundancy for critical environments. But, due to its architecture and design, Pandora is not one of these systems. Pandora is not an extremely easy system. It requires a previous knowledge on computer systems. Pandora is an extremely versatile and powerful tool that requires some kind of previous ability, knowledge and experience in computers.

What else could Pandora do?: Pandora is a monitoring tool that not only measures if a parameter is right or not. Pandora could evaluate the state (right, wrong and intermediate values) or store a value (numerical or alphanumerical) during months if it is necessary. Pandora allows to measure outputs, to compare values between different systems and to establish alerts on thresholds. Pandora works on a database, so it could generate reports, statistics, service adjustment levels (SLA) and measure anything that gives or rejects a data. This means that Pandora could measure any thing: operating systems, servers, hardware systems and applications-such us firewalls, proxies, databases, web servers, VPN, routers, switches, process, services, remote access to servers etc. All of these integrated in an open and distributed architecture.

To monitor a complex broadcast system was never so easy like today with 
Media-Alliance PANDORA Monitoring System.

CROSS PLATFORM: Pandora client is based on WEB and therefore runs in any operating system, while the server is based on Linux and uses an SQL database.

PANDORA Open Source: Pandora is open source and can be modified at need; it includes additional modules developed by Media-Alliance and that are supplied as binary (not open source).

What does Pandora Monitor?: Pandora monitors most of Media-Alliance applications services as well as Disk Archive ALTO archive system and disks with a response within 5 seconds. Available agents are for example: MediaXplorer, MatMan, Database, AVIO Video Server and related IT servers (for example HP or DELL). In addition to that it is possible to add third parties devices and for example today Omneon MediaGrid and MediaDeck are supported or EMC ISILON. Others can be added on request.

OPTIONAL ENHANCEMENTS: In case of a fault Pandora can send an email to administrator (of pre-definable recipients) with precise information about the problem.